William R. Stromberg wrote and directed “The Crater Lake Monster,” which came out in 1977, and it tells a story about what happens in the mountains of central California after a meteor hits a lake—a made-up one—and a prehistoric egg starts to grow there. That egg then hatches into something like a plesiosaur that causes problems for the people who live nearby. The movie’s name is misleading, because it doesn't actually take place in Crater Lake, Oregon. The filmmakers acknowledge this through things like the California license plates on the cars and the fact that the lake looks more like a snake than the round shape of Crater Lake in Oregon. The lake they used for establishing shots is about 425 miles southeast of Crater Lake, also in central California. It’s similar to what you might see on Syfy these days, but it was made cheaply in the mid-1970s. It doesn't have the same production values as other creature features from that decade, like “Jaws” (1975) and “Prophecy” (1979), and honestly isn’t even as polished as TV movies of the time such as "Snowbeast" (1977) or "Kingdom of the Spiders" (1977). The acting from the main cast really sets it apart in a negative way. However, the stop-motion effects are pretty good and get the job done, even if when the creature comes out of the lake, you can tell that something doesn’t quite look right with how it looks next to the water. Kacey Cobb does well as one of the female characters and she looks good in jeans, but her part is too short. There are some silly physical comedy bits from Arnie and Mitch that aren't much better than what you'd see from Skipper and Gilligan. Aside from that, the movie tries to be serious, and there are a few things it does well, like using nice locations, capturing the feel of the 1970s (the styles, decorations, etc.), and having a surprisingly touching ending. I never thought the plesiosaur seemed particularly frightening or powerful before, but this film gave me a different impression. The movie’s running time is 1 hour and 25 minutes and was filmed at Huntington Lake and Palomar Mountain in California. Richard Cardella also contributed to the writing. GRADE: C

Source on TMDB